Campaign of the Month:
November 2016

X-Com: Defiance

Pietermaritzburg – Has anybody else seen four perfectly round, bright orange orbs whizzing above the city in recent days?
Clarendon resident and Witness photographer Ian Carbutt said he was driving home along Roberts Road at 9.30 pm on Sunday when he saw three bright lights travelling towards Greytown.

He described the lights as “orange orbs”.

“At first I thought they might be paper lanterns, but they were all travelling in a row, there was very little wind and they were moving very fast.
“I stopped my car near The Wykeham Collegiate, but by the time I got out of the car, they had disappeared behind the trees, and then they were gone.”
However, just as he was about to get back into his car, he saw a fourth orb travelling in the same direction and quickly snapped a picture with his cellphone.

A Prestbury resident, who asked not to be named, said she and her partner had seen a similar orange orb in the night sky at around 7.30 pm one evening early last week.

The resident said they initially thought it might have been aircraft lights, but realised they would have heard engines at the height it appeared to be travelling.

“It moved across the sky and I took a photo with my cellphone, but it came out a bit blurry. It was very strange and I can’t explain it,” she said. The picture she took bore strong similarities to the one Carbutt took.

Pietermaritzburg Airport manager Alvin Naidoo said the Air Traffic Controllers at the airport did not have an explanation for the “orbs”. However, there had been a problem with people in the Clarendon and Prestbury area waving around lasers government officials have said. Both residents, however, said what they had seen “were definitely not lasers”.

Still No Answers On Mysterious Green UFO Lights In Cape Town

Cape Town – There were still no answers for the mysterious green lights that apparently appeared in the skies above Cape Town at the weekend with some people adamant they had seen an unidentified flying object (UFO) and others blaming a marketing campaign.

The South African Astronomical Observatory told News24 its understanding was the lights were part of a test for light show equipment at the Cape Town Stadium, based on information it heard mentioned on radio in the morning. However, the Cape Town Stadium referred News24 to the South African Rugby Union (Saru). The inaugural HSBC Cape Town Sevens takes place on December 12 and 13 at the Cape Town Stadium. It is the second leg of the HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series, a week after the opening tournament in Dubai (December 4 and 5).

Saru spokesperson Marlon Kruger told News24 they were unaware of any light equipment tests on Saturday when the lights were spotted.
“It is probably some sort of marketing campaign, but we do not know anything about it. If it was a test, I would have known about it.”

Here at HTXT.Africa we interviewed Gert Jordaan, founder of UFO Research of South Africa,

“Since the Roswell incident, many people do think that there is a cover-up. And since sightings span across the globe, many government officials will follow the footsteps of the American government and cover it up. In my research (which I will not go in too deep) I found that the American government made a deal with aliens. Their technology in exchange for experiments on humans and animal live-stock. I wouldn’t be surprised if other governments have done similar deals”

If you fancy yourself a local UFO hunter, and are wondering where you would have the most luck in tracking down Alf locally, Jordaan suggests packing your bags and head to KwaZulu-Natal.

“The three top places in South Africa where the most sightings come from is KwaZulu-Natal, Western Cape and Gauteng. KwaZulu-Natal is a hot-spot for UFO activity, maybe due to the mountain ranges. Western Cape is also a hot-spot since it is vast and open and does not have high light pollution.”

You will also have better luck when the temperatures start to drop.

“We see more sightings during winter time than any other season. We also receive a lot of sightings close to the end of each year.”

“As far as we know, we are the only organisation in South Africa who is interested in the UFO phenomena. We do have a lot of interest from people who would like to know more about UFOs. We receive a lot of requests from people who want to join in and help. That is a good sign to the UFO community in South Africa.”

In the late 1990s, my book Rediscovering Rachel (1996) was on display in the windows of bookstores across the country. You couldn’t seem to get away from it. It was even on Oprah’s book club. Anyone in the literary world or the United States, I know its funny to use those words in sequence, had read or knew someone who had read my book. For the more pedestrian reader, it was a heart-rending story. For the astute, it was a metaphorical journey of the soul into the depths of hell. For me, it was a bit more personal. In the most important sense it was my life, an open wound festering for the world to see. They didn’t understand and who could blame them, it was purposefully obscured to protect the innocent and sinners alike, living and dead. If I were honest with myself, which I seldom am, it was mostly protecting me from myself.

People say my life got out of control just before my divorce in 2009. Those people didn’t know me, no one really did. Few people got close enough to see the duck tape holding me together ever since the events that inspired my first book. After the release of my first novel, I was spent mentally and emotionally. This was around the time I went to NYU. I was hiding behind a mask of bravado and a life of partying (in the extreme). My next novels, Still Life: Violin and Fish and The Visiting Hours, were flops. I was under tremendous pressure to write and publish but I had no inspiration. I am amazed that through one of the worst periods of my life two amazing things happened. I found the love of my life, Mary-Beth Fraser (married Nov 12th 1999) and I had a son Kyle (born March 22nd 2001).

The story behind the title of my fictionalized “autobiography” Literary Genius: Suck my Penis, is really the story of how I met my wife. As was usual in those days, I spent the nights partying. So it was unsurprising that at 9pm on a Saturday night I was hammered out of my mind. I was in first year university and saw a beautiful girl as she stepped out of the library with an armful of books. I walked up to her, dropped my pants and said, “I’m a Literary Genius. Suck my penis!” She slapped my face so hard, I tripped over the pants that were down around my knees.

Shortly before my life really went down the toilet, I was inspired not nearly to the degree I had been in my youth when I had put my soul on the page. Nonetheless, I started writing Literary Genius and my editor went wild with excitement. The book came together quickly. One moment I was walking in the clouds like an angel then the book was done and I entered another period of depression. I started up the partying again but this time it was sexual adventures that really took their toll. The “rumors” of extramarital affairs culminated with my divorce (June 2009). As if that wasn’t bad enough, my life had really hit rock bottom when I woke up next to my wife’s divorce lawyer, no offense to Mrs Van Clemens, Esq. and her sexual capabilities. The drinking, drugs and wild sex, eventually led to my termination as Professor at USC (September 2012). I still remember my hearing with the head of the English department. I was so stoned I could barely walk, I stumbled to my seat and said, “In my defense, I had no idea there was a policy in place against sleeping with students.”

My life in the adult film industry was for the most part overblown. I was in a bad place. Alcohol and drugs were a haven. My agent set up a meeting with some producers. I was so depressed that I got hammered for the meeting. I started ranting and raving about J.K. Rowling and her success with Harry Potter. I think I said something like, “Harry Potter, that stupid pecker, 7 books later and he still hasn’t gotten laid. Harry Pecker. Hermione, wouldn’t mind ‘her-on-my-knee’. She could be my prisoner of ass cabin any day of the week and Ron, he’s all about the ass. In McGonagall’s class, Hermione turns her small breasts into the perfect rack, Ron shrivels his penis and Harry’s pecker grows out to 12”. Snape’s the professor of the dark arts (once you go black there’s no going back) and Harry’s playing with some Yiddish girl waiting to catch the golden snatch." Meanwhile, one of the producers’ assistants is trying to take down my whole drunken tirade and the producers’ are adding comments and throwing around ideas. My agent escorted me out smiling and later that sent me a 6 film contract to sign.

The films did well, the producers raved about my brilliance, but I felt like I was pounding my head against a brick wall. It was on the set of Sex Machina (2015), the last film of my contract that I had my final public breakdown. I was drunk, feeling low, bitter and I walked out onto one of the sets, I saw an attractive blond who reminded me of my ex-wife, I stumbled, held myself up on the arm of a couch and said “Literary Genius, suck my penis” then I fell over the arm of the couch hitting my head on a coffee table. When I came to there were bright lights in my eyes, my pants were around my ankles and this blonde was going down on me. I tried to push her off, to stand up only to fall right back down and started screaming expletives. Later that week, the video had gone viral on social media, was shown with strategic pixelation on the national news and I received the last of many “You complete assh*le” texts from my ex-wife.

Years ago from the time I left the adult film industry after my breakdown, I had been traveling the world attempting to ski and surf on all continents. I still have Australia and Antarctica left unfinished. I was mostly broke, having earned money teaching English as a second language, as a male escort and even prostituted myself by writing a Harlequin romance style novel under an assumed name. Almost 2 years ago I finished a ski trip at the Tiffindell Ski Resort in South Africa. I had met James Ellison, a rich trust fund university aged kid who was planning an Antarctic ski trip. He told me to meet him in Cape Town for some surfing along False Bay, after we’d catch a flight to Chili and then be off to Antarctica. I did meet him again in Cape Town but the surfing never really happened. He must have drugged me because the next thing I knew I woke up in Lentegeur “Psychiatric” Hospital.

The wing of the hospital I was in, was doing experimental research on the magically talented. Besides me, there was an old Chinese woman, and a young Indian girl. The old chinese woman was in bad shape when I got there and it was only a few days before they took her away and didn’t bring her back. Kiara, the young Hindu girl, was 4 years old. She’d been recently taken from her mother. She spent most of the first few days crying. Eventually I was able to talk with her and try to take her mind off of her situation. Back then I knew a mind link spell, luckily the cells we were in were one next to the other. We had a concrete wall between us. So if we sat with our backs to the wall, we could mind link and communicate freely without fear of being overheard by our “doctors”. If I let myself think about those days, I can still feel the terror and sadness that Kiara would project over the mind link. I can honestly say that for the sake of the little girl with me, I tried to focus on whatever positives I could. Either some of the happy moments from my life or just that I wasn’t locked up alone. Each day they would take one of us away at a time, draw some blood, sometimes they would give us injections, pills or attach us to machines of some sort. We were both living in fear that they would separate us completely and we would truely be alone. It didn’t take long for our fears to be realized. About a month after I got there, they took Kiara away for her daily tests and they never brought her back. When they brought me my food that evening, I screamed at the guard, shaking the bars, demanding to know what they’d done with her. Eventually he told me they were transferring her to another facility.

About a week later, when that same guard came to give me my evening meal, I managed to get him with an influence spell. He unlocked my cell, opened the door and came to sit down across from me. I was so surprised it worked, I just sat there staring at him for a few seconds before jumping to my feet and grabbing the keys and locking him in the cell.

When he realized what was happening, he started shouting at me to let him out and pulled out his gun. I managed to get out the door before he got the first shot off. I ran down the hall and reached a security door that I couldn’t open. I had been holding a clairvoyance spell, looked through the door and saw another security guard heading my way. I levitated myself to the ceiling right above the door and held myself there while the guard opened the door and ran down the hallway to the room where our cells had been. I had jammed my arm down to prevent the door from closing fully and I lowered myself and ran through. I let out a ball of lightning at the door, hoping it might fry some circuits and keep it from being opened for a bit and then continued down the hallway. I found a janitor supply closet that had some overalls so I threw them on and continued towards a side exit.

I levitated over an electrified fence into the main hospital compound, ran past another building and almost right in front of a truck. Luckily the driver spotted me and slammed on the brakes.

“Help, they’re after me!”, I yelled out as two security guys on the other side of the electrified fence opened fire.

“Jump in, quick like”, the driver said as he started peeling away, “I’m André”.

At the main hospital building, a well dressed female nurse who’d witnessed the scene through a window, stops her flirting with a hospital security guard and grabs a cab at the hospital entrance. While changing out of her disguise, she makes a call, “Hello Kari, it’s Jax. I just saw Bryan Daniels. He might be available for work again.” After she hangs up, she links again, “Grayson, can you dig up what you can on a guy named Bryan Daniels here in Cape Town? … Yeah, he might have some information that I want. Thanks.”

“So they killed an ‘alien’, but someone took the body away and all you have is a sample of green ‘blood’ left behind? Come on Jaiya, this just sounds like more of the crazy stuff that got you in trouble in the first place.”

“Tujhe maa ki kasam, Kari. I’m not making this up. I know it sounds paagal, but I saw it with my own eyes. The analysis kit couldn’t even identify the blood sample. Something very strange is going on up there.”

“Haan. You remember the hospital that Bryan was staying? The one you asked me to help break him out from? He claimed he was abducted too, and they were conducting research on prisoners there… some of them children. And the little girl at the farm talked about being in a place where other children were being experimented on. I think they might be talking about the same place!”

“So?”

“So, I need to get into that ‘hospital’ and have a look around. Kiara could be there, or at least some evidence of where she was taken! I need your help to get back in, with enough time and manpower to look around properly.”

“Jaiya! It took weeks just to arrange for your ID badge and Bryan’s cell door to be left open. How am I supposed to get you and a whole group of people in there? We’re not talking about a public gallery here! That place has some serious security!”

“Which is why I need your help, Kari. You obviously have some contacts and I need to get into that hospital. After all… if we find my daughter I could go back to making movies and paying you your 10%.”

[deep sigh] “Ok, fine. I’ll see what I can do, but it’s going to take some time. And I think I might have to raise my cut to 15%.”

“Aap ek gudiya rahe! Thank you Kari! Call me as soon as you have something!”

“Ok, Jaiya, I’ve looked into getting you access to the hospital and it is just not going to happen. Security has been upgraded since the breakout. You would need to be an employee to get in now and they aren’t hiring.”

“But you pay me for results and I think I’ve come up with a plan. It is a long shot Jaiya, but my contact thinks this job might get you and your team access to that hospital. I don’t know the details, but he said you might need to reprise your role from Voodoo EMS, you know the one where you sing ‘I don’t care what the book says; we’re on the streets now—my streets—and you darn well better hand me that rib spreader before I hit you with this Halligan tool!’”

“You are to meet a Mr. Morphine at the McDonald’s on Granger Bay 3 days from now, you will know him by the “Rhino’s in ’13” t-shirt. Like I said, it is a long shot, and don’t worry I’ll keep looking."

Sanjay returned to watching the movie Voodoo EMS starring Jaiyana Kumar-Singh. She was a street smart paramedic able to talk to the dead. This was the scene where some corporate goons tried to kill her and partner, but Jaiyana survives the attack and her partner’s ghost helps her bring the corporation to justice!

“Target approaching. sir.” the voice said over the comm unit.

The speaker sounded tense, but obviously still in control. “Acknowledged. Panther One. Keep steady.” Earl Brown replied. He adjusted his Ares Golgotha-7 smartgoggles and strained his ears until he too could hear the distant wail of a siren. From his vantage point on the third floor of the unfinished office building, he could make out most of the construction yard below. It was a moonless night. so he couldn’t exactly see everything as if it were day, but the ambient glow of the city was bright enough to let him pick out details. He could even see Panther Team, crouching behind the massive bulldozer only ten meters from the edge of the drainage ditch around the site.

The siren was closer now. He could just make out rapid flash-es of blue light on the sides of buildings to the northeast. “Team Panther and Team Gentry, you have yellow. Repeat. you have yellow. Team Equinox, activate sequence oh-five-niner Bravo.”

He removed the goggles and waited, watching the street beyond the huge. open gates to the site. Equations burned through his head as he calculated and instinctively corrected for wind speed and distance. He took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, reassured by the ice-cold logic and clarity of the numbers.

The ambulance’s wheels screeched as it took the turn at 50 kph. sirens screaming and lights flashing. As its Front wheels touched one end of the gravel bridge that spanned the drainage ditch. Earl whispered. ’Fire one."

A dull roar and a hiss came from his left. Earl kept his eyes on a spot at the other end of the bridge, on the small scrap of metal he’d placed there fifteen minutes ago. The rocket screamed through the air in a gentle arc from the second floor. It slammed into the ground and detonated. dead center in Earl’s field of vision. The ambulance slowed and swerved away from the blast.

“Fire two!” Earl shouted over the explosion, already looking toward the left side of the bridge where a second scrap of metal lay, Another roar and a hiss split the night as the second rocket sped towards its target. The impact showered gravel for meters around the spot.

The ambulance tried to swerve out of danger. but the force of the blast lifted the vehicle’s right side off the ground. it balanced for an instant on its left wheels: then it tipped and rolled off the bridge, it slammed to the dirt, skidded. and came to rest against the far wall of the ditch.

“Team Panther and Team Gentry. you have green. Repeat. you have green.”

He watched the men emerge from behind the construction equipment and fan out near the edge of the ditch. Some moved into position on what remained of the bridge, their rifles at the ready. Sporadic popping echoed from below as they fired on the ambulance, focusing their attack on the vehicle’s exposed underside. Earl picked up the Barret and repositioned his srnartgoggles. He aimed for the crumpled form at the base of the building and fired once. The form jerked wildly, then lay still.

“Bait has been discarded. Team Equinox, you have black, Repeat. you have black. See you at the rendezvous in thirty minutes.” Earl didn’t wait for acknowledgement: he didn’t need to. Quickly and carefully. he broke down the rifle and placed it in its case. After taking a last look around to make sure he’d left nothing behind, he headed toward the workman’s elevator.

“Teams Panther and Gentry. what’s our status?” he murmured as he walked into the freight lift and pressed the Down button.

“Targets neutralized. sir, Thermal imaging shows the only heat sources in the ambulance as cooling bodies or coaling metal.”

Earl removed the earpiece and slipped it into his pocket as he strode through the workman’s gate behind the building. Whistling, he deposited his gear in the back of the rented jackrabbit. Maybe he’d take in a movie after the rendezvous: it seemed like the right way to celebrate such a wonderful night.

Sanjay’s commlink rang. The brief annoyance at the movie’s interruption turned to joy as caller id popped up with Jaiyana’s sexy picture. What a wonderful night.

The Quidditch of Relationships

We’ve been heading north west for an hour or so. According to our instructions we should be almost halfway to the farm.

“Sanjay, Dude! You really need to work on that drooling problem and be a little more conscious of your staring. I’m sure she can feel your eyes drilling a hole in the back of her head. You’ve already got her autograph, twice I might add, and a picture of you standing near her. Maybe I can explain this in terms that you’d understand. You’ve seen the Harry Potter movies, right? And the XXX versions?”

“Yes, that is quite correct, many times. May I say, I am a big fan of your XXX trilogy.”

“Oh thanks, so let me explain this to you in Quidditch terms. Heterosexual men basically come in four types. First you have the chasers, they chase women mostly for the conquest and then move on to the next one. Much like in Quidditch, they score if they get it in one of the three “rings”. Preferably all of them. I’d guess Soccer Mom Roy would fall into this category. Really I’m just judging that based on the hair. Next you have the seekers, they are on the search for the golden snatch."

“By the golden snatch, you mean the great catch? A golden haired goddess? Like snaring a great beauty?”, Alan asks.

“Yes but a bit cruder than that.”

André leans over and whispers something in Alan’s ear.

“By God, guard your tongue man! There are women present.”

“Are you insinuation that she wants my tongue so badly I need to guard it?”, I look back to Sanjay, “Ignore Alan but I guess he missed the three rings comment earlier but continuing the analogy, you have the keepers, these are the men who find or want to find the one woman for them, keep them and protect their ‘rings’ from the chasers flying about. I think André and Alan probably fall into that category. Now Jax is targeted mostly by seekers, chasers would quickly realize they don’t stand a chance. She was already married either her husband was a seeker or a keeper based on what’s been in the tabloids since they split, I’d guess seeker but I could be wrong. He could just be recovering. My point is that Jax, I doubt she wants to be chased by anyone and definitely not by you. Sanjay, my friend, you are a beater.”

André snickers. Sanjay’s brow furrows.

“Beaters, you know, they take it into their own hand sometimes with a little aid from the interweb.”

“Yes, I understood your beater reference”, Sanjay blushes a bit, “I was just wondering, you categorized everyone but yourself. What would you be?”

“An asshole.”

André, Alan and Roy all laugh.

“No, seriously?”

“A serious asshole.”

The laughter continues, I notice even Jax can’t keep a smile from her lips. I had been keeping an eye on her expressions to judge the accuracy and reaction to my statements. The smile though makes me drop the clairvoyance spell and close my eyes. It looks so similar to her daughter’s. Suddenly I feel as alone as I was that last week in my cell in Lentegeur.